Joe Bentley
Ding Dong! Merrily on High Definition TV
posted
Most people who now about the history of computer science are at least a little familier with Alan Turing, the British scientist who was influential to the creation of much of modern computer science.
Also fairly well known is that Alan Turing was an unapologetic homosexual, which was a crime in England in the 1950s. Convicted of "gross indecency" Turing was forced to undergo hormonal therapy. The side effects of this treatmeant is widely believed to have lead to him commiting suicide in 1954, by eating an apple that had been injected with cyanide.
Well there is a rumor in the IT industry that the apple logo of the rainbow colored apple with the bite taken out of it is meant as a tribute to Alan Turing, symbolising both his homsexuality and his suicide.
-------------------- "Existence has no pattern save what we imagine after staring at it for too long." - Rorschach, The Watchmen Posts: 8929 | From: Norfolk, Virginia | Registered: Jun 2002
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quote:Although Apple logo designer Rob Janoff started off with the silhouette of a black apple on a white background, he knew that something was missing and incorporated a few changes. In a 1980s conversation with French artist/designer/photographer Jacques Moury-Beauchamps, he remembers the reasoning behind the new look: "…I think that people responded to the colours and the joke of the shape. There’s a little bit of a pun in the way that the shape is designed. The bite that is taken out of it: it’s not only the silhouette of an apple – you couldn’t take a bite like that out of any other piece of fruit shaped that way – but byte is also a computer term.
"So from the beginning really, I think that what computer people responded to was the little double meaning there in the shape. It’s not always that you have the chance to have that kind of fun with the viewer on a logo. Logos are usually so serious!"
Bill Kelley, who also worked at Regis McKenna Advertising, remembers the thinking behind the bite a little bit differently. He says that the bite was a symbol of acquiring knowledge, a biblical reference to eating of the apple from the tree of knowledge.
quote:About the colours, Janoff explained, "One of the reasons was that at the time, [the Mac] was the only home computer that was available to hook up to a colour monitor and reproduce colours at an affordable price. That was one of the big features and because of that, it was thought that it would be especially valuable, primarily in the education market." Bill Kelley added that it was Steve Jobs who came up with the idea of the colours and determined several of the hues.
posted
Jobs also happed to have spet a summer picking apples at an Orchard somewhere (memory escapes me) for a summer or two. Jobs loved apples.
-------------------- W.W.F.S.M.D? But this image of Bush as some sort of Snidely Whiplash tying the fair maiden to the railroad tracks is beyond the pale. - Joe Bentley Posts: 2311 | From: Minnnesota | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
Here's another source. (And if you like computers and history that site's a really interesting read).
quote:As they prepared for the display at the First West Coast Faire, it was decided to create a new corporate logo. The original one, used in sales of the Apple-1, was a picture of Isaac Newton sitting under an apple tree, with a phrase from Wordsworth: "Newton...'A Mind Forever Voyaging Through Strange Seas of Thought...Alone.'" Jobs had been concerned that the logo had part of the slow sales of the Apple-1, and the Regis McKenna Agency was hired to help in the design of a new one.
quote: Rob Janov [sic][14], a young art director, was assigned to the Apple account and set about designing a corporate logo. Armed with the idea that the computers would be sold to consumers and that their machine was one of the few to offer color, Janov set about drawing still lifes from a bowl of apples ... He gouged a rounded chunk from one side of the Apple, seeing this as a playful comment on the world of bits and bytes but also as a novel design. To Janov the missing portion "prevented the apple from looking like a cherry tomato." He ran six colorful stripes across the Apple, starting with a jaunty sprig of green, and the mixture had a slightly psychedelic tint. The overall result was enticing and warm ...
[Steve] Jobs was meticulous about the style and appearance of the logo ... When Janov suggested that the six colors be separated by thin strips to make the reproduction easier, Jobs refused.[5]
For the Faire, Markkula had ordered a smoky, backlit, illuminated plexiglas sign with the new logo. Although Apple had a smaller booth than other companies displaying their products at the Faire, and some of the other microcomputer makers (Processor Technology, IMSAI, and Cromemco) had been in business longer, Apple's booth looked far more professional, thanks to Markkula's sign. Some of the other participants, companies larger than Apple, had done no more than use card tables with signs written in black markers.
-------------------- "Unseasonable is an odd word to begin with. It sounds like it's describing something that it's impossible to sprinkle pepper on." -- Nonny Posts: 5483 | From: Just south of Folsom Prison, CA | Registered: Jul 2002
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posted
At a time when many computers had green-only graphics, if you had color, you wanted to tout it in your packaging. Of course, Apple kept their rainbow logo when the original monochrome Macs came out, but reverted to a single-color logo now that Macs can display very vibrant colors...go figure.
Also, around the time when Apple became popular, rivals Atari and Commodore both had rainbow logos.
(And yes, I know that the 400/800 and C-64 came around years later than the 1976 Apple logo. I'm just illustrating a trend.)
-------------------- There are 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary and those who do not.
"Are you pondering what I'm pondering?" - The Brain Posts: 587 | From: Colorado | Registered: Jul 2000
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quote:About the colours, Janoff explained, "One of the reasons was that at the time, [the Mac] was the only home computer that was available to hook up to a colour monitor and reproduce colours at an affordable price...
Minor nitpick -- It was the Apple II, not the Mac. The first Macs had monochrome monitors.
-------------------- "Unseasonable is an odd word to begin with. It sounds like it's describing something that it's impossible to sprinkle pepper on." -- Nonny Posts: 5483 | From: Just south of Folsom Prison, CA | Registered: Jul 2002
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posted
I'm almost sure this was already covered here on snopes but, wasn't the apple logo a tribute to the Beatles in some way... I wish I could remeber how?
-------------------- Come on! Ninja kick the damn rabbit! Posts: 273 | From: Ontario, Canada | Registered: May 2004
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quote:Originally posted by melliferous muffin: I'm almost sure this was already covered here on snopes but, wasn't the apple logo a tribute to the Beatles in some way... I wish I could remeber how?
Considering McCartney is angry at apple since they group formed Apple records long before Apple was a large company, i doubt one had anything to so with another, Jobs would nt want to invite a lawsuit. I doubt that very much.
-------------------- W.W.F.S.M.D? But this image of Bush as some sort of Snidely Whiplash tying the fair maiden to the railroad tracks is beyond the pale. - Joe Bentley Posts: 2311 | From: Minnnesota | Registered: Mar 2004
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